Today we can watch tidal rhythmites form. Reineck and Singh describe them:
"Rhythmites of the tidal environment, on the other hand, are made up of
alternating sand and mud layers. Thus, layers of a single couplet differ
mainly in grain size. As a result of strong tidal current activity,
sediment is fractionated; sand is deposited during periods of current
activity, while mud is deposited during still-stand phases. The layers of
tidal rhythmites can be followed only for a few meters, in some case for
probably only a few decimeters." ~H. E. Reineck and I. B. Singh,
Depositional Sedimentary Environments, (New York: Springer Verlag, 1980),
p. 129
Some of the most amazing items are contained in the periodicities and
thickness ratios of tidal rhythmites. One can determine the length of the
year, the period of the moon's orbit (and thus its distance) the rate of
the earth's rotation etc. This can all be accomplished from tidal
rhythmites today.
What is further fascinating, we find tidal rhythmites in the geologic
column, but I am only going to talk about 3 of them today. One, the the
Big Cottonwood tidalites of Utah which date about 900 million years ago
(myr) and the elatina and Reynella rhythmites which date at 620 myr. All
of these rhythmites are from the precambrian or preflood according to the
global flood model. The global flood model holds that the preflood earth
was catastrophe free, yet these sediments contain evidence for a pre-flood
catastrophe and they contain evidence of an energy release during the
global flood which would kill everyone and everything on earth.
According to the periodicities of the two precambrian rhythmites the rates
of earth rotation and the lunar orbital period was drastically different
from now, and there was a major change in those parameters DURING THE
PRECAMBRIAN (or Preflood). Between 900 myr and 600 myr ago (or if the
global flood advocate prefers, between the Elatina and the Big Cottonwood
time), the length of the day changed from 20.9 hours to 21.9 hours/day. The
lunar orbit also changed. If you scale the precambrian time scale to the
1656 years of preflood earth (according to Ussher) you find that this
change in rotation took about 115 years. Since only a meteor impact could
alter the earth's rotation in that time frame it means that there was a
preflood catastrophe of global proportions which is not mentioned in
Scripture. In fact the energy to change the preflood rotation is equivalent
to about 60,000 times the energy released in the meteor that killed the
dinosaurs.
But even more interesting is the change from a 21.9 day rotation rate at
the end of the Precambrian (preflood) time to the present 24 hour day. If
one calculates the energy required to change the earth's rotation one
needs the equivalent of nearly 20,000 megatons of energy per square
kilometer of the earth's surface. Thus to account for the observed change
in the earth's rotation from the precambrian to the present in a global
flood model, one must postulate a astronomical catastrophe that no flesh
could have survived without divine help. But if one calls upon divine help
to solve this problem, then one cannot claim that the scientific data
supports the global flood.
To put this in terms of the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs, we find
that this energy is the equivalent of several thousand Chicxulub impacts.
"Computer models of explosions with energies of 1,000 megatons--about
20 times the energy of the largest nuclear bombs but only 1/100,000 the
energy of the KT impact--..." ~ Walter Alvarez and Frank Asaro, "An
Extraterrestrial Impact," Scientific American Oct. 1990, p. 80
In fact it is equivalent to about 100,000 K/T impacts during that single year.
At the very least, this would melt the outer crust of the earth, if not the
entire earth.
I would beg my young-earth brothers to cease claiming that the science
supports their global flood position. It doesn't
Here is the data with some of my calculations from the data.
900 myr 620 myr today
earth radius 6378388 m 6378388 m 6378388
mass of earth kg 5.98E+24 kg 5.98E+24 kg 5.98E+24
hours in day 20.9 hr 21.9 hr 24 hr
seconds in day 75240 sec 78840 sec 86400 sec
omega (w)rotational 8.35E-05 rad/s 7.97E-05 rad/s 7.27E-05 rad/s
speed
rotat. inertia (I) 8.03E+37 8.03E+37 8.03E+37
energy (1/2 Iw^2) 2.8E+29 2.55E+29 2.12E+29 joules
900-600 myr 600-0 myr ago
energy difference 2.5E+28 joule 4.27E+28 joule
energy difference (megatons) 5.95E+12 1.02E+13
energy in K/T impact units 59510.45 101636.9
area of earth= 5.11E+08 km^2
MT/square km 19880.16
Reference G. E. Williams, "Precambrian tidal and Glacial clastic Deposits:
Implications for the Precambrian Earth-Moon dynamics and Paleoclimate,"
Sedimentary Geology (120(1998):55-74, p. 62
glenn
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
Foundation, Fall and Flood
& lots of creation/evolution information
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm